Required Reading

The Chronicle included several educated-related stories over the weekend. In case you missed them: *The last day of school marked a final farewell for four elementary schools in Houston ISD. But as a former principal of one of the schools, Grimes Elementary, said in the article: “You can take the building. You can’t take the […]
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Sen. Gallegos on the attack *State Sen. Mario Gallegos, D-Houston, continued his public blasting of Houston ISD Superintendent Terry Grier, this time ridiculing him (and fellow Democratic state Sen. Rodney Ellis) over a bill that would allow HISD to use local funds to start the school year early at the Apollo campuses. Gallegos was upset […]
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Time to catch up on education-related news before spring break ends (sigh): *The Washington Post offers a fascinating inside look at how the new teacher evaluation system works in D.C. public schools. Reporter Stephanie McCrummen was able to sit in on a tense conference between a teacher and the “master teacher” evaluating him. Houston ISD, […]
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Hisd Taxes 0223 c *Houston ISD officials are weighing a property tax hike and/or reducing the optional homestead exemption in the face of severe state budget cuts. See how much various scenarios could cost you (via Google docs). *If you missed HISD’s live TV show about the budget, you can watch and listen online here. […]
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We can’t offer you snow — or a snow day — but how about today’s top local education news? *Texas lags slightly behind the national average when it comes to passing rates on Advanced Placement exams. Read the full report here. Brett Coomer / Houston Chronicle Former first lady Laura Bush works with Stovall Middle […]
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In cased you missed these stories: *I wrote today about the Texas Education Agency reducing the number of questions students had to get right to pass the TAKS this year. TEA officials say it’s because the questions were harder. But some cast doubt. Read testing contractor Pearson’s memo on the process. See TEA’s cut scores […]
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It was a wild day in education Thursday: *Read our story about HISD’s investigation of Key Middle School, which uncovered charges of nepotism, financial profiting off children and cheating on the TAKS. *This story has fights over race, gender and even transvestites. You guessed it. It’s a story about the State Board of Education debating […]
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First, the quiz: *Twitter is abuzz this morning with the Pew Research Center’s “How Millennial Are You?” quiz. If you don’t know what Twitter is, you probably shouldn’t bother taking it. (I scored 63 out of 100. I’m not sure if that’s good or not. The higher the score, the more millennial you are.) Now […]
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Lots of education news to catch up on: *Texas could lose $1.3 billion a year for low-income students under President Barack Obama’s proposal to tie federal Title I funding to adopting college- and career-ready standards. Texas is in a pickle because it hasn’t joined 48 other states in the common standards initiative that Obama is […]
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The theme of this link post is — you guessed it — HISD’s unanimous vote on the teacher evaluation/dismissal policy Thursday night. *Here’s our story and live blog of the meeting. *Texas Watchdog posts an unflattering video of Trustee Harvin Moore’s lecturing the crowd at the board meeting for boo-ing supporters of the policy change. […]
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